Removal of water from land vehicles and water vehicles helps to maintain that shiny new showroom look on a vehicle. Proper maintenance requires drying off the exterior surface of the vehicle to effectively remove water spots that otherwise will remain on the surface of the vehicle. One of the many techniques vehicle owners have employed to dry their vehicles is a reusable chamois. The use of a chamois is common because it is highly absorbent, soft, and scratchless. Typically, the chamois is passed over the exterior surface of the vehicle to collect water before the water can evaporate and leave water spots on the exterior surface of the vehicle. However, a chamois is not capable of drying an entire vehicle without having to be wrung because the chamois becomes saturated with water; thus the chamois is typically wrung out by hand multiple times and then used again to continue drying the remaining wet exterior surface of the vehicle. Hand wringing the chamois is an effective way to expel water from the chamios but only if the user has strong hands; otherwise water is not expelled out evenly from the chamois and small areas of water will continue to remain on the chamois, thus the chamois will not perform as well as it did when it was dry.
Clearly, it would be helpful to make use of a wringer for the purposes of drying a chamois. However, a fixed wringer would not be convenient since it would be located at distance from vehicle. The use of fixed wringers has long been contemplated for expelling liquid, dating back to the 1930's when washing machines were commonly equipped with a wringer to remove excess water from clothes to allow for faster drying time. Although fixed wringers on the washing machines were convenient for when washing clothes when washing a vehicle it is disadvantageous and inconvenient for the vehicle owner to have to go a remote location apart from the quarters of the user or vehicle to use the wringer. The prior art, overcame this disadvantage with wringers mounted onto remote surfaces. For instance, U.S. Pat. No. 4,920,877 to Foster et al., discloses a hand crank wringer system constructed to be mounted to a wall or a similar structure. However, because of the mobility that comes with the use of a chamois and drying a vehicle, similar mobility would be desired in the '877 wringer. Other disadvantages associated with the '877 device is the use of a hand crank typically becomes tiresome and the mutual contact between the rollers, which allows for maximum expelling of water from the material, is typically lost over time. In addition, if getting to the wringer or the actual wringing takes too long, the wet vehicle which remains in the sun will begin to form water spots on the surface of the vehicle.
It would then be advantageous for the wringer to be just as mobile as the user, thus the user need not come to the wringer it should be near the user at all times for fast, effective, and portable utilization. However, typical portable wringers have its associated disadvantages. For instance, U.S. Pat. No. 6,571,586 to Ritson et al., discloses a hand crank chamois wringer that attaches to any flat surface using suction comprising of a support structure, and a pair of rollers driven by a crank handle. The support structure carries a suction device that with the turn of a suction cam lever the suction device sticks into place until the lever is released. The drawback is the need for a flat surface for the device to adhere to. Furthermore, it is not rigidly attached to the window so the device wobbles as the chamois is passed through the rollers. Additionally, U.S. Patent No. 2007/008404 A1 to Evans et al., discloses a chamois wringer that is easily and quickly installed on a support structure (i.e. backrest, bucket, bench, workstation, etc.) comprising of a wringer body containing the rollers, a wringer handle for operation and turning of the rollers, and a means to mount the wringer body to an external support structure. However, because a chamois is most likely to be used outdoors to dry a boat or a motor vehicle the dependency on a support structure to mount the wringer body makes the invention unviable because a sufficient support structure may not be readily available. Additional drawbacks in these two portable wringer devices are that the use of hand cranks may be tiresome for some users; and overtime the mutual contact between the rollers is lost due to mechanical failure. Thus the force applied on the chamois as it passes through the rollers to expel liquid is lost and sufficient liquid is not expelled.
Other portable wringer devices that maintain mutual roller contact are found in the prior art; however, ease of use is not so apparent. For instance, U.S. Pat. No. 5,193,364 to Leenders, discloses a chamois wringer that includes a base plate with an arm, herein known as a foot plate, pivotally connected thereto. A first roller is mounted on the base plate and a second roller is mounted on the pivotable arm, such that the pivoting of the foot plate will bring the second roller into rolling contact with the first roller. A chamois interposed between the rollers will be placed under compression as it is pulled up between the rollers. The compressive force is applied between the rollers by stepping on the footplate and water is thereby removed from the chamois. The drawback is that the device must be either used on a flat surface or affixed to a surface to be used effectively. The user is also forced to bend over to pass the chamois through the device, for a user with back problems this device may aggravate their condition. A potentially dangerous injury to a user's back may occur because the chamois is jerked through the rollers while force is being applied all the while the user is bend over.
While these patents disclose devices that may be suitable for their particular purpose to which they address, these devices would not be suitable for the purposes of the present invention as heretofore described.